


Cold Morning Coffee

by vladamsandler



Category: LazyTown
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, M/M, sportarobbie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 05:29:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9370055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vladamsandler/pseuds/vladamsandler
Summary: Based on this Tumblr post by neyieagetslazy:"I bet Sportacus is the type of person who genuinely enjoys shoveling snow; he sees the physical exertion and hard work of it and loves to make it into a sort of game.He’d also be the sort of neighbor who got up at 6am to do his own driveway and then just decided to do yours too, and he’d leave a little note on your front door telling you to have a nice day."





	

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS MY FIRST FANFICTION EVER. I'm basing a lot of the weather stuff on what I know/experience, but apparently chinooks are unique to the particular part of the world I live in?? I guess just imagine LazyTown is in western Canada. 
> 
> Disclaimer: the Icelandic is straight from Google Translate.

The recent chinook has begun to pass and Robbie can feel the cold in his joints as he stirs sugar into his morning coffee. He glumly peers out the window over the rim of his mug at the layer of fresh snow covering the backyard. The temperature dipped again in the night. Single negative digits was as good as it ever got in wintertime here, appearing when warm winds slide down the nearby mountain range to alleviate the normally dry, biting cold of LazyTown’s mid-winter months. A glance at an app on his phone confirms that the high today was going to be -12C and Robbie quietly groans to himself, trying to decide if bundling up and walking to work would be less of a hassle than digging out his car with the snow shovel and ice scraper again.

He crosses the foyer to check the hall closet for the scraper and makes a double-take out the window. His front walk and the sidewalk in front of his house appear to have already been cleared of snow... Did someone shovel for him? He checks his watch.

_07:52_

“What kind of maniac…” he mutters as he sets his coffee on the entrance table and opens the door for a closer investigation of his front yard.

He almost doesn’t notice it at first, a small blue post-it stuck to front door. Scrunching his shoulders up at the air nipping his skin through his heavy sweater and plaid button-up, Robbie scowls at the offending note on his property. He snatches the slip of paper and shuts the door, retreating back into the warmth of the kitchen.

_Have a nice day! :-}) -S_

Robbie squints at the note suspiciously. Who is S? And who draws smiley faces with a mustache?? Robbie is deeply disturbed. He’s no stranger to random acts of kindness, you couldn’t be living in this good-for-nothing town, but rarely were such actions aimed at him. He might as well be the villain of his neighborhood. He didn’t interact with his neighbors often, but often enough for most of them to steer clear of the grouchy man on a regular basis.

Glowering at the little mustachioed face, Robbie tries to remember if anyone in the neighborhood has a name that begins with S. He can only vaguely recall overhearing the couple living next door arguing about moving companies a couple weeks ago. He has somewhat of a penchant for spying on the people in his neighborhood, but that was becoming more difficult this time of year when families stayed inside and kept their doors and windows firmly shut to keep the warmth from escaping their homes.

He finishes his coffee and checks his watch again. He’s spent far too much time pondering the mysterious note and was now nearly late for work. He crumples the paper and stuffs it in his pocket. Whatever, he has more important things to worry about than friendly people wasting their time for no good reason. Robbie only worries about himself, as it ought to be.

 

* * *

 

A few days following this incident, Robbie wakes one morning from a fitful sleep to see his alarm has yet to go off. He briefly considers rolling over and trying to capture just a few more Z’s before he has to start getting ready for work, when he hears it. A sort of rhythmic scraping sound, coming from outside. He peers out from under his fluffy orange comforter through the crack in his bedroom curtain. It had snowed again in the night, the mysterious S must be outside shoveling again!

Robbie rolls out of bed, quickly wraps his robe around himself and stuffs his feet into his furry orange slippers. He trudges to the front door, stopping to turn his coffee machine on in the kitchen, and checks out his front window for the irritating good-samaritan. Sure enough, his front walk has been cleared of the fresh snow again and Robbie can see a figure just finishing up the sidewalk in front of his house. He checks the clock on the microwave through the doorway to the kitchen.

_06:43_

With irritation from being awake at this god forsaken hour for no good reason and from not having his coffee yet, Robbie yanks open the front door to give the trespasser a piece of his mind.

“You know I have a shovel of my own, I didn’t ask for any favors from some stranger!” he barks at the figure, now seen clearly than through a frosty window. The mysterious shoveler appears to be a stocky young man in a puffy blue coat with white and black stripes down the sides, and a matching scarf and hat. At the sound of the door and his exclamation, the man whips his head in Robbie’s direction with wide eyes, frozen with shovel in hand. Now with a good look at his face, Robbie’s first impression is that the man is actually about same age as him, just appearing younger due to his height and athletic vigor shoveling.

His second impression is that the man is …incredibly handsome. Robbie himself freezes up as the man offers a lopsided smile and approaches his front door.

“Hi! I’m Sportacus, I just moved in next door about a week or so ago. It’s nice to finally meet you!”

Robbie’s mind is blank. He glances nervously down at the mittened hand extended to him and tries to remember how speech works in the face of such a beautiful smile.

“Um,” Sportacus withdraws his hand awkwardly, “I took care of shoveling your walkway for you, I hope you don’t mind.” He keeps smiling sweetly up at Robbie, eyebrows pinching up slowly in confusion at his silence.

Robbie blinks a couple times and clears his throat. “Agh, yes, hi. I’m Robbie. Thanks for… clearing the snow for me.” He clears his throat again. “This time and last time. It’s really unnecessary.”

“Oh it’s no trouble! I kind of enjoy it actually. The exercise wakes me up.”

Robbie blushes at the sound of the other man’s foreign accent. He was always a sucker for cute accents.

“Yes, well, I’m sure you have better things to be doing at this time of the morning than doubling your work shoveling.”

“It’s alright, really, I’m usually awake at this time anyway. I find it difficult to sleep past 6AM. Besides, it’s better to shovel the snow when it’s fresh than after it becomes compacted.” Sportacus smiles again and Robbie watches his strangely pointed mustache jostle with the movement. It was adorable? Also explains the smiley face on the note.

But Robbie shudders at thought of waking up at 6AM every morning. This Sportacus really is some sort of maniac.

“Uhh, right. Well, again, it’s really uncalled for. But if you enjoy it so much the least I can do is offer you something in repayment.” Robbie begins to blush again and concentrates so as not to stumble his words. “Perhaps you’d be up for a cup of coffee? I just brewed a fresh pot.”

Sportacus somehow smiles even bigger and his eyes sparkle with something Robbie can’t place.

“That sounds lovely! Thank you very much!”

Sportacus leans his shovel gently against the railing on the porch and steps inside as Robbie walks back into the kitchen. As Sportacus carefully tries to remove his boots without tracking snow in the foyer, Robbie nervously checks his reflection in the microwave door. With butterflies in his stomach he licks his fingers and quickly tries to smooth his bedhead curls into something a little more presentable and grabs two mugs from the cupboard.

Sportacus enters the kitchen holding his coat, hat, and scarf in his arms as he politely admires the inside of his neighbor’s quaint, if not a little messy, home.

Robbie turns around with the sugar dispenser in his hand, but his question dies in his throat when he looks as the other man. It was so strange to see another person in his home after isolating himself from other people for so long, a handsome gentleman no less. Robbie blushes again for umpteenth time as he takes in Sportacus’ soft golden curls and broad, muscled shoulders under a white and blue t-shirt. Sportacus’ cheeks and nose are flushed, presumably from the cold outside and the physical exertion of shoveling. He still has that stupid smile on his face, Robbie thinks as he realizes he missed whatever Sportacus just said.

“Um, I’m sorry?” Robbie squeaks bashfully.

“I said no sugar for me please. I take my coffee black.” Sportacus smiles at Robbie’s nervousness. Hopefully his own blush wasn’t showing. He’s been incredibly curious about his next-door neighbor after going a week without having the opportunity to meet him. He’s been hoping to make a good impression by helping him with the shoveling, but after meeting the tall, lovely man, Sportacus quietly resolves to shovel Robbie’s walkway every snowfall from then on.

“Right.” Robbie sets the sugar dispenser back down on the counter. “You can just throw those things anywhere.” He grabs the two mugs and moves toward the table.

Sportacus stuffs his hat and scarf in the coat pockets and hangs the jacket on the back of one of the chairs at the table. He sits down with Robbie and pulls his mug closer. The two men both quietly sip their coffee together for a minute or so in silence.

“So how’s-”

“Thanks again for-”

They stop talking at the same time and blush at each other for a pained second. Sportacus breaks the tension, “You first.”

“Um, I was just going to say thanks again for shoveling. This weather can be a real pain in the neck sometimes.”

“It’s my pleasure, Robbie. Thanks for the coffee, it’s delicious.”

“Hm,” Robbie hums into his mug. What is he even doing? Why did he invite a stranger into his home just minutes after meeting him? What happened to worrying only about himself? Sportacus’ quiet voice breaks Robbie from his thoughts.

“I actually like this kind of weather, it reminds me of home. My daughter too. She’s probably already up making a snowman in our front yard as we speak.” Sportacus chuckles nervously as he looks down at the table. He knows mentioning his daughter always seems to scare people off. He’s found it best to bring her up sooner rather than later when talking to someone he’s interested in, in case they consider her too much baggage and lose interest off the bat.

“Where’s home?”

“Reykjavik,” Sportacus smiles, relieved.

“Oh, I thought your accent sounded familiar. My mother is from Iceland.” Robbie begins to relax, realizing that he’s actually enjoying the conversation now that he’s had his morning coffee.

“Really? That’s wonderful! _Getur þú talað íslensku??_ ” Sportacus finds himself leaning forward in his chair, suddenly even more enthralled by Robbie than he was before.

Robbie smiles shyly. “Um, not really. I used to a little bit. I can only understand it - if it’s spoken slowly.”

“You’re amazing,” Sportacus says softly.

Robbie blushes furiously and breaks eye contact. “So… what brings you and, uhh, your family to LazyTown?”

Sportacus’ face drops and he slowly leans back in his chair. He takes another sip before responding carefully. “It’s… just me and Stephanie now. We needed… a new start. After…”

He trails off, deep in thought. Robbie suddenly has a horrible feeling he’s just stepped on some sort of emotional landmine.

“I’m sorry.”

Sportacus glances up, “Hm? Oh, it’s alright,” he offers a small smile, “That’s all in the past now.”

They sip at the rest of their coffee for another few minutes, but Robbie can only taste his own foot. His gaze wanders to the clock on the microwave. “Ah well, I should start getting ready for work soon.”

“Oh, of course!” Sportacus tips what’s left of his drink back quickly. “This was very nice Robbie, thanks again for the coffee,” he smiles brightly up at Robbie as they stand together.

“Anytime Sportacus,” Robbie replies clumsily, caught off guard again by his dazzling smile.

“Be careful, I may take you up on that,” Sportacus smirks as he slides his coat back on.

Robbie tucks his chin, smiles, and blushes once again, managing to place the mugs in the sink without breaking anything.

They move into the foyer together and after Sportacus quickly ties his boots, Robbie opens the front door for him. On the porch, Sportacus grabs his snow shovel and turns around thinking there’s more he has to say, but can’t figure out how to word his feelings.

“I like your slippers,” he eventually remarks, lamely.

“Um,” Robbie quickly glances downward and smiles timidly, “hah, thanks. Perhaps next time I can try to be properly dressed.” He looks back up to see that nameless sparkle in Sportacus’ eyes again.

“Next time,” he smiles warmly at Robbie.

Robbie watches the other man make his way down the cleared path and turn towards his house. He sees a small snowman wearing a pink knit hat in Sportacus’ yard and hears a young girl laughing at something Sportacus says. Robbie gently closes the door with a distracted smile. Next time.

 

* * *

 

A couple days later Robbie wakes to his alarm blaring. Another restless night. He trudges to the kitchen like a zombie to turn on the coffee machine. He checks the temperature on his phone.

_-17C_

He groans and looks up at the ceiling, wondering if he could induce the next chinook through sheer willpower alone.

He prepares for work quickly, but is of course late again as he runs out the door, ice scraper in hand. However, just as he’s finished locking the door he notices another blue post-it in front of him. Robbie grabs the note and turns around, realizing belatedly there had been a heavy snowfall that night and the walkway and sidewalk in front of his house had already been cleared once again. He stares down at the note with a half-smile and small butterflies in his stomach.

_R,_

_XXX-XXX-XXXX_

_Next time? :-}) -S_

**Author's Note:**

> btw the X's are supposed to be a phone number... if that wasn't clear.
> 
> also if anyone has a better suggestion for a title, hmu...


End file.
